Silence Is Easy
by paintedbynumbers
Summary: Post-1:5. On the eve of his departure from LA, Miles Edgeworth seeks to confront the revelations of Lana Skye's trial through an unlikely source, and discovers more about his past than he'd wished for. P/E friendship. GS 1&3 Spoilers.


**Disclaimer: **Gyakuten Saiban and its respective characters all belong to CAPCOM.

**Author's Note: **I haven't written this genre for several years, and there have been so many brilliant authors writing Edgeworth that I'm really quite nervous about this fic! But I have always wondered about the contents of Phoenix's letters and Edgeworth's past, so here it is. Also, I have no beta-- if you spot any typos/grammar errors I would greatly appreciate you pointing them out in a review, or PM or something.

There will be SPOILERS for all of AA and minor references to T&T 3-1 and 3-4.

The quote in the first sentence is an actual line from T&T 3-5, when Edgeworth examines the guard/security camera in the Detention Center.

* * *

**Prologue**

One of the many invaluable lessons Miles had learnt under the mentorship of Manfred von Karma was that 'if something glares at you, it's only polite to return the favour'. And just as he'd been accustomed to do for the past 15 years, he was currently obeying the command without question.

He only wished the perpetrator wasn't making him feel so ridiculously foolish – it wasn't every day LA's High Prosecutor spent his evening locked in a staring contest with the back of his office doors. Even more alarming was the fact that he seemed to be losing – though whether the term referred to this bizarre little game or the state of his own sanity, he couldn't be sure.

The door was grinning – no, _sneering _– at him broadly; he didn't care how ludicrous he sounded, he could see it right _there _opposite him. Imprinted on his office door, the ends of the blank grey lines curling up at the corners to jeer at him, tease him, mocking the pathetic state of his current existence. It was as clear as the contradictions in one of Larry's testimonies. He could even hear its voice as it now chided him with a twisted sort of delight, "_You and me, Worthy…we're the same…"_

"Mr. Edgeworth?"

Miles' elbow nearly sent his office lamp flying in surprise. After narrowly saving it from shattering to the ground, his eyes shot back to the door, but the ghastly dismembered smirk was no longer there. Instead he was greeted by his young secretary, who was holding the door open with one hand, a teacup and saucer in the other, and looking really quite bewildered.

"…A-Are you alright, sir?" she stammered, glancing nervously at the sheen of perspiration forming across Miles' flushed face. "I didn't mean to frighten you, but no one responded after I knocked and so…"

_How the hell did I miss her knocking for that long?_

"I…no don't alarm yourself, Hannah, it was nothing…just wasn't paying attention…" Miles mumbled, trying to steady his erratic breathing. "Did you have something for me…?"

...

It was nearly 6 o clock before Miles had the office to himself again.

It had taken almost 20 minutes to convince Hannah that yes, he was perfectly alright, and no, he didn't feel feverish or nauseous in any way; a doctor would be quite unnecessary. It had taken him another 10 to persuade her into taking an early night off to enjoy the evening with her friends, and even then, she had dithered back and forth from her desk, brandishing last-minute documents for him to sign and fretting about the state of his tea and so forth, until Miles had finally had to adopt his infamous courtroom glare and frighten her into submission.

"_People would think you actually ENJOY working overtime on a Friday evening, Hannah!"_

"_With all due respect sir, I think you forget who I work for."_

He never really had a chance of countering that.

...

The first thing Miles had done after finally regaining solitude was, of course, checking back on the state of his mystery door demon – but it was gone, as invisible as it had previously been clear. Seeing the dimly lit lamp he had almost destroyed before, he was suddenly overcome with relief at finding the 'grin' had just been the light and shadows playing tricks on him. It evaporated almost instantly when he realized he had spent almost 15 minutes mentally sparring with a phantom, a trick of the light, because he'd been deluded enough to ignore the most _logical _possibility of it being an optical illusion. After catching the lamp from falling, he had replaced it on the table without a second thought – it was now sitting almost 3 feet away from its original position, facing the complete opposite direction as its light spilled onto the magenta sofa cushions below.

Miles sighed, letting the familiar, passive silence of the empty Prosecutor's Office wash over his aching head. Insomnia... or exhaustion, whatever he was currently suffering from – _temporary insanity wouldn't surprise me_ – it was clearly taking a dangerously heavy toll on his body and mind. Hallucinations...daydreaming...the worst part was that he had absolutely zero control over it. Miles only ever willingly relinquished his personal control over matters to one thing, and that was his work.

For reasons he didn't care to pursue, people – mostly women, though Larry occasionally added to the unwelcome crowd – frequently badgered Miles about his personal affairs, enquiring why a smart, handsome young man like himself was still single. He usually responded with the short answer, a curt glare that bore the unmistakable message, 'I fail to see how it's any of your bloody business', but a joke from Hannah a few months back had made him consider the real possibility.

"_Don't be silly, Mr. Edgeworth can't possibly date! He'd be cheating on his work! Hahaha!"_

Miles admitted it was probably the closest explanation that would ever come up to the truth. The conjunction of 'Prosecutor Edgeworth and work' was one of those unofficial associations that everyone took to be without question, much like Wright with his miraculous turnabouts, or Franziska and any variation of the word 'fool'.

Work was more than an addiction for Miles – it was the control ship for his entire _living. _It wasn't that he spent every waking moment reading over case files or thinking about evidence lists, though he certainly came closer to it than most people. It was more of the fact that his work formed the blueprints on how to run his daily life – without it, the basic tangents of his day to day activities simply ceased to exist. He ate to keep energized through the long day. Tea was drunk to caffeinate himself after a long night at the office. When dressing, his attire was carefully selected to evoke the image of pretentious confidence and professionalism in court. It was as simple as that. Even his rare bouts of leisure time had to aid his work in some way – he had begun watching 'The Steel Samurai' as initial research into the Will Powers case, and now could only harbour his fondness for the kid's programme through the self-conviction that the show would be a punishing reminder of the time he had purposefully aided his opponent to a not guilty verdict.

Romance – or relationships in general – did not fit into this work-safe category of acceptable behaviour. To involve himself in any kind of relationship beyond those required for work needed mutual trust and dependency from both parties. That had been Von Karma's gospel since day one.

_Friends make you dependent, Miles. And lovers – vulnerable. You cannot hope to achieve Von Karma perfection with such crude and unnecessary weaknesses in your life. I trust you understand? _

Yes, of course he had. That last statement had never really been a question, after all.

...

The ochre streaks of twilight had long since been consumed by the blanket of nightfall when Miles finally allowed his eyes to settle on the polished wooden filing cabinet attached to his desk.

It was pathetic really, to be afraid of something as trivial as a cabinet drawer. Past investigations had often revealed unpleasant truths within these hidden compartments of furniture – loaded guns ready to strike at any moment, deadly toxins that could shut down nervous systems in a matter of minutes. But Miles knew the bottom drawer he now focused on contained nothing more than the standard documents and papers a filing cabinet shouldhave – after all, he was the only person who possessed the key to the lock he'd installed on it 2 months ago. But his shoulders did not relax.

_Foolish fool, _he could almost hear his sister sneer at his irrational hesitation, unable to understand how a Von Karma could let something as insignificant as a few old case files and discarded letters affect him so.

Miles knew she would never understand. Paper itself was flimsy material, unable to cause little more damage than a paper cut and easily destroyed by fire in an irreversible chemical reaction. But the words they enclosed within their corners could etch themselves irrevocably into one's mind, never to be erased, as they had in his...over the course of the past 15 years.

Before he had a chance to argue with his inner common sense, Miles swivelled his chair round and took out the key from under its hiding place, the hakama of the Steel Samurai crouched on his window sill.

...

The drawer slid out clumsily, jammed with an endless torrent of haphazardly crammed in brown manila folders that clearly wished to defy a filing cabinet's purpose of preserving important documents for future reference. Crumpled pages, folders being buried under their neighbours – it was obvious that at the time, the owner had very little intention or desire to ever read these files again.

Miles' fingers flicked past several labels as he searched for his target -- _Fawles – Darke – Fey – Powers – _all written in the same neat, controlled script that bore the sole sense of any order in this chaotic filing nightmare. Cases that had passed. Cases he never wanted to remember again.

He hit wood and realized he'd reached the end of the drawer. Bending further down, he blindly felt around for the crumpled shoebox he knew lay stuffed somewhere in the corner. Squeezed in behind an especially bulky mass of brown and white, he felt his fingers grapple at cardboard and miraculously managed to heave it out without breaking the box or the drawer.

Miles tugged at the red ribbon enveloping the box, letting it spiral down to the floor in ripples of silk. He didn't bother picking it up.

He gently blew away the dust that had collected on the lid's surface and cupped the corners with his fingers, relishing the familiar texture of the worn out card lump that had continuously instilled that temporary, blissful sense of comfort these past few years.

But would it be the same, this time round? Or would it finally spell out to him the harsh truth? Why he felt his stomach churn every time he glimpsed that ostentatious suit framed so proudly on the wall, or why he had felt the sudden violent need to rearrange the pieces on his chessboard this morning, starting with the spiky-headed blue pawn in the very middle?

Everything was set. In less than 24 hours he would be onboard a non-stop flight to Paris, escaping the city which continued to tear at the fragile stitches keeping his past locked away all these years. Pess had been placed in the finest boarding kennel in town, and the letter asking Detective Gumshoe to check up on him weekly would be mailed on the way to the airport. His bags were packed – a single leather satchel containing his wallet, cell phone and weathered German passport. Miles needed nothing else. As much as he wished otherwise, his real baggage was not the type that could be physically weighed and shipped off for pick-up at a later time. If it was, he would not have been spending his last night in Los Angeles seeking counsel from a tattered old shoebox of letters.

He didn't know why or how, but Miles knew that somehow, _someway, _there was one thing that would help him understand the mess he was in. It might not solve anything, and the bitter reality of what he discovered could be more than he wished to bear. But if he left without even attempting to pursue the truth, he knew the doubt would haunt him until it consumed him altogether.

Two words. One name.

_Phoenix Wright. _

Trembling slightly, Miles removed the box's lid and reached out for the very first envelope in the pile.


End file.
